Weighing the Right to Choose (4/11)

By Caitlin Kelly-Sneed

Oct. 16, 2003

In the early 20th century, with tensions running high, ardent women's rights advocate Susan B. Anthony came up with the notion that she should be allowed to vote in public elections.

Women's rights have progressed enormously since Anthony's time. However, one issue still divides the country -- a woman's right to choose whether to end a pregnancy.

Many groups in the United States are fighting for women's rights, but today, instead of fighting for the right to vote, they are fighting for a woman's right to privacy. Opposing them, the Bush administration is moving toward a ban on partial-birth abortion, a politically-coined term for a number of abortion procedures usually performed during the second or third trimester of the pregnancy. One procedure involves extracting the fetus from the womb and using forceps to collapse its head. Partial-birth abortions constitute less than 1 percent of all abortions and are often performed because of serious defects in the developing fetus, according to the Alan Guttmacher Institute Web site (www.agi-usa.org).

In mid-March, the Senate passed a Republican-sponsored bill to ban partial-birth abortions. If the House also passes the bill, President George W. Bush said he plans to sign it and make it a law, prompting individual states to decide whether or not they will uphold the law, according to a March 14 Los Angeles Time article.

If the bill passes, it will overturn the 1973 Roe vs. Wade Supreme Court decision, which legalized abortion in America by ruling that the constitution guaranteed the right to privacy, further ruling that this right "is broad enough to encompass a woman's decision whether or not to terminate her pregnancy," according to the Save Roe Web site, (www.saveroe.com). California state senator Sheila Kuhel recently authored a bill in conjunction with Planned Parenthood Federation of America, which allows a woman reproductive rights in California, according to Brooks. After being passed by the State Senate, Governor Gray Davis signed the bill, making it a law.

Currently, all forms of abortion are legal in California, but soon women may not have that freedom if the House votes in favor of the abortion ban. Federal law takes precedence over state law, making doctors in every state vulnerable to the ban if it passes, according to Planned Parenthood representative Erin Brooks.

Brooks said Planned Parenthood believes that "the right to privacy and the right to choose are fundamental civil rights," adding that a woman's "right to choose is paramount and in serious jeopardy."

Chemistry teacher Synthia Green agreed that the right to privacy is a fundamental civil right. The abortion debate is "a question of what you have the right to do to your own body," Green said.

In contrast, pro-life advocate and National Right to Life Committee representative Joe Landrum said a developing child has the basic civil right to live. He believes that immediately after conception, the developing child is a person and deserves all the basic rights as a person.

The penalties outlined in the bill do "not apply to a partial-birth abortion that is necessary to save the life of the mother whose life is endangered by a physical disorder, physical illness, physical injury, including a life-endangering physical condition caused by or arising from the pregnancy itself," according to the Partial-birth Abortion Ban of 2003.

Although the ban allows some pregnant women to have a partial-birth abortion for life-saving reasons, after the loss of the right to choose, the law will force other women to seek more dangerous alternatives to end pregnancy, according to Brooks.

"Women will have fewer and riskier options," Brooks said. "A pregnant woman may be forced to carry the fetus to term against her will, even if she discovers that she has a life-threatening condition, or that the fetus has been irreversibly damaged, such as developing without a brain. Women will resort to more complicated and dangerous methods of terminating their pregnancies such as having surgery to remove their uteri completely."

Before the Roe vs. Wade ruling, about 10,000 women died each year when they tried to abort their pregnancies, according to Green. Women tried to terminate their pregnancies by "using coat hangers and knitting needles," Green said.

Although many pro-choice advocates feel that abortion is sometimes the healthiest option for the fetus, Landrum opposes all abortions. "I wouldn't support killing a person who was born injured or malformed," Landrum said. "I wouldn't support killing that person in the womb."

As for the health of the mother, Landrum said that although he has never heard of a situation in which a partial-birth abortion would be essential, he would support doing what is necessary to save the mother's life.

"Sometimes the child can't be saved," Landrum said.

The National Right to Life Committee's goal is to "restore legal protection to innocent human lives threatened by abortion and euthanasia," Landrum said. "If we can't protect the weakest in society -- the old, the sick, the unborn -- how can we be safe?

"Our long term goal is to ban all abortion," Landrum said. "Many politicians support us on (banning partial-birth abortion), but don't support banning all abortion."

Landrum foresees positive results to come from the law. "Hopefully if the law is passed, it will make people think twice about using abortion at that stage of the pregnancy," Landrum said, adding that it may make them think about how well-developed the baby is in the second trimester.

If the law does pass, it will not just prevent dilate and evacuate abortions, but will outlaw a number of procedures, according to Brooks. The ban states, "Any physician who ... knowingly performs a partial-birth abortion and thereby kills a human fetus shall be fined under this title or imprisoned for no more than two years, or both." The ban later defines partial-birth abortion as delivering a baby partially, either until the doctor exposes the head or until the physician extracts the legs and torso, then "performing an overt act that the person knows will kill the partially delivered living fetus".

Brooks said, "I think most of the public doesn't understand what this ban will outlaw,". If the bill passes, Brooks said she thinks "there will be public outcry."

Any doctor vaginally removes the fetus from the womb, either whole or in pieces, or kills the fetus outside the womb, will also be in violation of the ban, according to Brooks.

Landrum sees this ban as a step in the right direction. "We're really pleased (with the Bush administration)," Landrum said. "It just makes sense to save human lives. We prefer living in a society where we are safe from each other."

Science teacher Scott Dickerman disagreed, saying that he believes the Bush administration members have no place involving themselves in abortion issues. "The Bush administration should not be allowed to get their hands on anything," Dickerman said, "it's all politics and ideology with them."

Dickerman found fault with the involvement of morals in politics. "This is a medical ethics question, and it should be left that way," he said, adding that women should have the choice whether to have an abortion, and that the decision should not be defined by anyone's politics.

Nebraska proposed a similar ban on partial-birth abortion three years ago, but the Supreme Court struck it down in Stenberg vs. Carhart decision, which states that every abortion restriction must contain a health exception that allows an abortion when "necessary, in appropriate medical judgment, for the preservation of the life or health of the mother," according to Planned Parenthood's Web site. The Supreme Court ruled that the ban did not take women's health into consideration, therefore making the ban unconstitutional. The court also ruled that because the ban's wording was written so that it banned some of the safest and most common abortion procedures, it put an "undue burden" on women's abortion rights.

The San Francisco branch of Planned Parenthood has faced little opposition from pro-life advocates, according to Brooks. "We're pretty lucky here; 85 percent of Bay Area voters are pro-choice," Brooks said, "We don't face much opposition."

Although much of the Bay Area is pro-choice, Brooks is not optimistic. "I think this is an ominous first step toward banning all abortions," Brooks said.

Roe v. Wade: Overview

- January 22, 1973 Supreme Court decision

- Validates that under a woman's constitutional right to privacy, she would be able to decide whether or not to end her own pregnancy and attain a legal abortion

- Ruling changed laws in 46 states

Partial-birth abortion ban of 2003

- Proposed February 14, 2003 to Congress

- States that dialate evacuate abortion, the medical term for abortion past the first trimester, is never necessary to preserve the health of the mother and is outside of the standard of medical care

- But the ban doe not apply to partial-birth abortions that are "necessary to save the life of the mother whose life is endangered by a physical disorder"

- Bill indentifies the fetus as a full, legal person entitled to constitutional protections under the U.S. Constitution

- Regards "partial-birth" abortion as infanticide; the bill defines the procedure as "brutal and inhumane"

- If passed, the law will make illegal a number of procedures of abortion that use many of the same steps as dialate and evacuate abortion

- If doctors continue to perform this procedure, they will be subjected to fines and up to two years in prison

To find more information about Roe v. Wade and the upcoming decision, please visit Planned Parenthood Federation of America (www.PlannedParenthood.org) and the Natural Right to Live organization (www.nrlc.org).

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